The Petra Zone

While going through some old files I found my autographed 1986 Greg X. Volz - Pieces of Eight Newsletter. I did not know I still had it. I thought others here might like to see it:

cool, he did a lot of touring looking at that schedule.

I didn't know Joe English was in the band.

They were in Norway too, in 1987 guess. I was there and remember Joe English was the drummer. They played in the same Athletic hall where Petra played the same year when the stage collapsed. Did Greg had something to do with that? http://www.petrafiles.com/images/230_87a.jpg

Anyway, I took a lot of photos from the Greg X concert, and I remember I bought the album "The River is Rising".

-

I was able to attnd the tour stop in Orlando at the Tupperware Center. Kim Boyce was astounding and Pieces of Eight were fantastic. I have a whole bunch of negatives from that night somewhere. I will scan them in and share them once I find time to get to it someday. One mroe thing to do... =)

Oh, and I ordered the video ( http://www.petrafiles.com/petraspective ... 01VHS.html ) from the newsletter and got the free t-shirt that came with it. I sold the shirt and a poster I bought at the concert on eBay when time were rough years ago. I wonder if someone here bought them from me. I still have the video though.

Someone posted a fuzzy version of the contents of that video here:


And while I am yammering, I also have a never published youth ministry video Greg Made sometime in the early 90's (guessing here) and an unpublished CD from the mid 2000's that had a remake of a Petra song (I cannot remeber which one) somewhere. More to dig out and share someday.

Great stuff!

Is this the youth ministry video you\'re referring to: http://www.petrafiles.com/petraspective ... knees.html

Well, I recently bought The River Is Rising VHS, but I\'m not sure it\'s original. It\'s only a plain VHS tape with a label on the edge that seems to have been added later. Does your video have any labels or artwork? If so, I would love to post pictures of those on my website. The merchandise ad sees to suggest that it does have a box with The River Is Rising artwork.

And of course I\'d love some info about the unpublished CD from the 2000s to put on my website. Never heard about that one. I think I read somewhere that Greg was working on a CD after The Exodus in the early 90s, but that he abandoned that project due to several unidentified circumstances. It wasn\'t until 1997/8 that he started recording again. Is this CD you have maybe that project or it is a project that he recorded after The Next Sphere? Any idea why it wasn\'t published? Seems like a waste of the recording effort (and time and money).

p-freak wrote:Is this the youth ministry video you\'re referring to: http://www.petrafiles.com/petraspective ... knees.html

I beleive the copy I have is a pre-production promotional version of this. I suspect it was used to try to sell the idea of the project. I am surprised to see that it actually got made. Your video looks like is the same subject matter, although I am not sure mine has all of the content that made it in to the official version. I do remember Greg's daughter being in it.

p-freak wrote:Well, I recently bought The River Is Rising VHS, but I'm not sure it's original. It's only a plain VHS tape with a label on the edge that seems to have been added later. Does your video have any labels or artwork? If so, I would love to post pictures of those on my website. The merchandise ad sees to suggest that it does have a box with The River Is Rising artwork.

The one I received did not look like the one in the newsletter. It came in a hard black VHS case with a 1/3 height typed label. There is no picture, but it does not sound like the copy you got. I will try to find a picture to post for you.

p-freak wrote:And of course I'd love some info about the unpublished CD from the 2000s to put on my website. Never heard about that one. I think I read somewhere that Greg was working on a CD after The Exodus in the early 90s, but that he abandoned that project due to several unidentified circumstances. It wasn't until 1997/8 that he started recording again. Is this CD you have maybe that project or it is a project that he recorded after The Next Sphere? Any idea why it wasn't published? Seems like a waste of the recording effort (and time and money).

I remember reading this page at about the time I came to own the CD: http://www.gregxvolz.com/article.html?ID=2 I think I have this project. I have to figure out where it is... I am pretty curious myself now.

Well, the On Bended Knees video was originally filmed in 1991 and only released in 1993, so it could well be that there are these kinds of promotional pre-production things out there. Does yours have artwork? Would love to see it then.

It sounds like my TRIR video might not be so fake after all. Mine comes also in hard black VHS case. It has only one label on the side of VHS tape itself saying Greg X. Volz - The River Is Rising TRT 8:09.

Well, that lost project sounds interesting. Let us know what you find out.

I have uploaded a picture of the label on my VHS here: http://www.petrafiles.com/petraspective ... 01VHS.html

There is a similar label on the black case as well.

Could you compare it to yours and tell me if mine is the same? If it is not, I would love to see a picture of yours (and add it to my site).

adpetrafan wrote:I was able to attnd the tour stop in Orlando at the Tupperware Center. Kim Boyce was astounding and Pieces of Eight were fantastic. I have a whole bunch of negatives from that night somewhere. I will scan them in and share them once I find time to get to it someday. One mroe thing to do... =)

Oh, and I ordered the video ( http://www.petrafiles.com/petraspective ... 01VHS.html ) from the newsletter and got the free t-shirt that came with it. I sold the shirt and a poster I bought at the concert on eBay when time were rough years ago. I wonder if someone here bought them from me. I still have the video though.

Someone posted a fuzzy version of the contents of that video here:


And while I am yammering, I also have a never published youth ministry video Greg Made sometime in the early 90's (guessing here) and an unpublished CD from the mid 2000's that had a remake of a Petra song (I cannot remeber which one) somewhere. More to dig out and share someday.

interesting to see John Lawry and Louie Weaver in this video. Note the Australian downunder t-shirt Louie has on? Must have been when they came from touring the country in '86....just a bit of trivia.

The song "Break out of the trance" was not on the LP. Was this album released on CD right away? Or was that song just on the tape version when it was released?

On "No room in the middle" there is also one song missing on the LP version.

The River Is Rising was released on CD pretty early. I have the early digipak release with the CD pressed in Japan. There\'s also an early pressing of Back To The Street like this. The first CDs for the American market were apparently pressed in Japan. I always assumed that they left off one song of the record to stimulate the sale of CDs, but then why would it be on the cassette? And this merchandise list seems to suggest that the CD wasn\'t available right after the release of the album. Strange.

I guess they left off Gethsemané for time reasons. If you want to press good quality vinyl, you shouldn\'t have more than 20-25 minutes on one side. And with Gethsemané side 2 would be almost 28 minutes, so that\'s probably why they left it off. Or maybe they also wanted to stimulate CD sales? It\'s curious then that they managed to squeeze almost 35 minutes on each side of the Petra Means Rock vinyl.

The sound volume of the Petra Means Rock LP was much lower than for other LPs. I guess everything was smaller.

Boray wrote:The song "Break out of the trance" was not on the LP. Was this album released on CD right away? Or was that song just on the tape version when it was released?

This question reminded me of a conversation with one of the members of Greg's crew at the Orlando concert. I asked them if they knew when a CD version of the album would be out. They did not.

Once the Digipac version was finally released I purchased my second copy of The River Is Rising. My first was a cassette that Greg signed for me that night. I believe I sold that on eBay about 10 years ago too... =(

I was able to find the two videos I mentioned earlier:
-----------------------------------------